Clean bill of health

The great expectations that preceded last year’s climate change conference in Copenhagen and which fizzled out in disappointment are in stark contrast to the muted hopes ahead of this year’s gathering in Cancun. But then the last year has been sobering for the environmental lobby. After the disappointment at a lack of accord in Copenhagen, the credibility of climate science was challenged in the wake of leaked emails
from a UK university’s climate science department. Then there were the errors in the last report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), while the recent mid-term elections in the US banged the final nail in the coffin of prospects for a federal cap and trade carbon pricing scheme.

All in all, it would seem that the clean tech sector is experiencing mixed signals, yet many involved in the field are cautiously optimistic. “In the long term, our perspective is quite positive,” says Albert Fischer, managing director of Yellow&Blue, a Netherlands-based venture capital (VC) firm. “The drivers for
the introduction of clean technology are still there. There is still a need for faster, better, cheaper, greener companies. I see opportunities for very good returns in this field.”In fact, a number of recent reports have reasserted that the fundamentals remain the same – i.e. that climate change is almost certainly man made and that failing to deal with it will have severe consequences.” “By overwhelming consensus, the scientific…